I want to point out a series of daily blogging prompts entitled Fearless Females created by Lisa Alzo of The Accidental Genealogist blog in honor of Women’s History Month which starts today, 1 March 2010.

* March 8 — Did one of your female ancestors leave a diary, journal, or collection of letters? Share an entry or excerpt.

Actually I have two.

Ann C. Whitall, the Heroine of Read Bank, the Battle of Gloucester

and

From Tennessee to California in 1849. Letters of the Reeve Family of Medford, New Jersey.

In light of the most recent “Who Do You Think You Are” episode, with Sarah Jessica Parker, and her Gold Rush Story, I’ll put a short quote from one of these letters.

Sacrament City, California
December 30th 1849

(Letter written by Rebecca Reeve and addressed to her cousin, Mary W. Ely, Medford Burlington County, New Jersey.

<snip>

Dear Cousin

With what feeling of happiness could I adress a letter to thee now, my first from this pleasant City, this City grown up as if by magic, this the end of our long and tedious journey. This our resting place and I expect future home, . If we could number three, but Ah my Cousin, brother R and myself only lived to reach the end of our journey. I have to nerve myself to look back and relate to thee the horrible death of our dear brother Clayton. I wish the task were not mine. I seem to almost feel the terrible arrows of the savage Indians pierceing me as they pierced our deat brother. He was indeed killed by them, killed by some of the most fierce and Savage tribe in North America. The Clamath Indians, of Clamath lake, Oregon. over at their hunting and fishing grounds upon Pit river, upper Californina, where the emigration passed.

<end snip>

These letters were published in The Journal of the Rutgers University Library, Volune XI, Number 2, June 1948.

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About this Blog

The purpose of this Blog has changed over time. What started out to be an online version of some old Worthington Descendant Newsletters.
It has become a way to journal about my adventure into Family History, sometimes called Genealogy.
The change for me is more about finding out the stories behind the names and dates that I find about the people I find in my research.